I love a good point-and-click adventure. A game that takes me through a crafted world and story, meant to evoke a sense of wonder when I solve a puzzle or find a certain item. I’ve recently had a great time playing a few of these, and now, digging into Helix: Descent N Ascent, I realize why games in this genre have been a blast for decades.
On the surface, the game feels familiar, but behind the black-and-white sheen is a tale worth exploring and characters worth befriending. Though a little obtuse at times, Helix: Descent N Ascent does a fantastic job of creating a deep, unsettling experience I can recommend to almost anyone.
Helix: Descent N Ascent’s Monochrome Madness
There’s very little to go on early in this game. Our playable creature falls from what looks like a mushy seed that splatters on the ground. Now, without any tutorial or audio or visual aid of any sort, you’re off to discover and uncover whatever you can. It’s not my favourite approach to a game, especially one that requires quite a bit of puzzle-solving and concentration, but Helix: Descent N Ascent constantly encourages the player to explore and experiment; in that sense, I suppose it works.
Luckily, the controls are easy to understand, and many of them appear on a small HUD in the corner of the screen. You’ll acquire quite a few abilities early on that will quickly become second nature and feel natural after a couple of uses. Again, maybe that won’t work for everyone, but eventually I met the game halfway and was switching and using my “arsenal” with ease.
All the puzzles throughout Helix: Descent N Ascent are well crafted. Simple button presses and combinations to open doors feel familiar, but the monochrome world adds to the flavour of each experience as the game progresses.
Once the five abilities are introduced and used, you can also combine them; it was a truly revelatory experience for me. I often walked into a room, stood there for a moment or two, and tried to figure out how I would approach things. Then it hit me! Like puzzle classics such as Portal, when you figure out a solution, you feel like a genius. And while that Valve classic allows more experimentation in a 3D space, this 2.5D world has one solution and still feels like you’ve cracked the code every time.
Dark, Yet Enchanting
The best and most unique way to see the world around you in Helix: Descent N Ascent is in its presentation. But it doesn’t start and end with its wonderful hand-drawn, sketch-like art style. This is built into the game as a distinctive puzzle solving mechanic. You’ll be able to switch between a more black
Helix: Descent N Ascent also doesn’t put any pressure on you as the player. You are free to explore and find solutions at your leisure. Whether it’s exploring the current or past few rooms you were in or just standing still and thinking about how you can maneuver through any particular pipe or hallway. There’s no timer or enemy ready to chase you down. It’s just you and your thoughts. This is a fitting approach for a game that also lets you sit with what the story and characters are trying to say.
I mentioned off the top that this is not a game with a whole lot of lead-up or explanation. But I found the discovery of what might be going on in Helix: Descent N Ascent quite special. The entire game is wordless; a game design and storytelling approach I don’t mind at all, though it may not be for everyone. And even though I appreciated what was being told and I don’t normally mind open-ended storytelling, I didn’t feel a huge sense of relief or closure when I finished the game.
Verdict
Helix: Descent N Ascent is another quiet, engaging game. It won’t hold your hand, but for most of the story, that’s a feature, not a bug. I don’t think the game’s approach to tutorializing and storytelling will work for everyone, but I do think the clever puzzle design and the excellently designed world are something we rarely witness in games nowadays. That alone makes this a title worth checking out.
[The publisher provided a copy of the game for review purposes.]
Reviewed on: Switch
